Has 5.2 lived up to expectations?

Afternoon all,

So pre 5.2 I was extremely excited to see how Rogues would go considering the hyped up buffs that we were going to get. So: Has it lived up to expectations?

I spend most of my time on the PvE aspect of things, currently 1/13 HC 25m so I have a somewhat decent scope of things; however, more recently I've gotten back in to PvP (Tried it in 5.1 and immediately stopped) - I used to play at 2200+ in WotLK on a DK but quit for the whole of Cata. So again, I have a semi-decent understanding of what's going on with regards to the PvP side also.

My initial reaction is: Yes. - In PvE we are the king of melee. And in PvP I actually enjoy it (compared to 5.1)

However, on a more in-depth look at things my opinion has slightly changed. (From a PvP perspective)

Out of the highest 50 teams a Rogue was present in 20% of them - So this shows the consistency between BG's and represents the much higher representation we have now when compared to 5.1

Disclaimer: I know these two BG's are not entirely representative of the whole of WoW PvP and I understand that the leader tables will change as the season go in; however, I can't read in to the future so this is what I'm using

On reflection, I felt that Rogues would be doing better than they currently are in PvP. This was due to the massive hype that was present on all forums about the 5.2 changes we were getting. But this led to me to understand that yes the buffs were good but it was more a cry of thanks that we would not be in the small dark whole that we were in 5.1.

Personally, I am happy with where we are. I wouldn't want much more than 20% of Rogues in the top 50 teams.

I suppose we're "up there", but other than raw performance I just find the gameplay dull. It feels to me like blizzard are desperately trying to fix something when they have no idea what the initial problem is, if there ever was one. So, I guess I just don't care anymore.

Definitely a performance boost in PVE and PVP from what I can see. Nothing drastic or game breaking, but enough to quell the QQ. I still think rogues need to be remade in 6.0 though. Our play style still feels boring and the only spec that really makes you work and feel like you're doing something (Sub) doesn't get the job done in PVE. Overall though, it brought rogues back to respectability so I guess I can't complain too much.

Can only speak for a PvE perspective here and say its lived up to the expectations. My expectations were minor quality of life things like Prep base so I can take Shadowstep... 1 min CoS etc. all in all some pretty nice but small buffs and a nice raid CD on top of that. But I also expected no change in playstyle and no change happened.
We are still energy starved without heroism/bloodlust (assa) and our styles hit for small amounts (although the Dispatch+Envenom buffs are noticable).
Its still annoying as hell outside of the raid to deal so little burst damage. Every bad equipped Enh, Ret, War or DK can easily global some questmobs, while I sometimes get bad streaks and deal 40k dps, waiting for it to die.

If they are going to keep us the (like GC said) "machine pistol" of the DPS and doing our damage through passive sources I want Slice & Dice gone at least. Make it passive or some kind of CD, I don't care.

Its still annoying as hell outside of the raid to deal so little burst damage. Every bad equipped Enh, Ret, War or DK can easily global some questmobs, while I sometimes get bad streaks and deal 40k dps, waiting for it to die.

GC: We know mut is ahead on dps, dw we are working on it.
Buffs combat very slightly. (Can't even remember if sub was buffed)
Buffs mutilate slightly...ok
Buffs mutilate even more ...wtf???

I'll be happy when combat doesn't need a botched up 4 piece bonus to be on par with other classes (still performs worse tho). Would love to see an approx +20% damage on flurry with 1 less target hit or something along these lines as currently I think it's too unwieldy(sp?).

I've been playing a rogue for a long long time now. I played wow since "vanilla" (Mainly Rogue and Warrior) and had a 6month break during cataclysm, returned to the game in MoP. Started off with my rogue in pvp again and had nothing to complain about in 5.0 and 5.1 for as far as i was concerned rogue was pretty oke back then. Now i kinda face the problem i'm getting bored on the rogue again. What ever specc you roll it's all about the same, Keep SnD, Rupture and poisons up on the target. Only things that change per spec are a few abilities like SS, Backstab and Muti But in general that is about it.

Now in 5.2 our damage has been buffed Oke that is great and we have some new eyecandy and fancy stuff like Cloak and dagger (which i think is useless, liked Hit 'n run better ).

I at least expected for blizz to adjust the rogue mechanics and combat it's been te same basic thing for ages now.
They've tried to do a little change on rogues by giving them Suriken toss! BIG MISTAKE ! Shuriken toss would of been great if it did a lot less dmg and was more of a tool to apply poison on ranged classes (Crippling poison and mindnumbing which was perfect in mop 5.1). Now as Rogue you are almost forced to take that damn ST to counter rogues in Arena and bgs, which i find very disturbing .
Most of the rogues that i face "try" to kite you by stunning you (don't even bother to put up rupture ) and just spring away using ST, if your shadowstep and blind is on CD you are almost forced to use ST yourself which becomes very dull because it's like spam ST and the one with most and highest crits wins "Skill". Most of the rogues i encounter just only use ST, sometimes you encounter a descent rogue who also times his CS, Ruptures, KS and SnD perfectly but they have become Rather Rare these days.

For met 5.2 was very disappointing, i was happy that the rogue population was about to grow again and represented in pvp once more. As far as rogues concern me, blizz should remove Shuriken Toss from the game (Deadly throw is good enough) and rethink te entire concept of rogue combat.

A few days ago (a week after 5.2 was released) i got my Warrior from under a huge layer of dust lvled him up and got me some gear and started to pvp on my warrior. I realy enjoy the tanking aspect of the warrior in pvp since i'm very objective minded (run flags, defend bases and ...).
But i also like the fact that you can change to a dps specc (SMF <3 olkskool fury (more or less)) so this class still holds some variation (like most of the classes but caster classes and paladins don't realy appeal to me (DK was oke but it lost its touch )).

So i think i'm going to stick with my warrior for a while untill Rogues get some nice new mechanics or complete revamp, and i think most of the "old" rogue players out there think the same!

- I think we are doing insane damage.
- Fixes pre-MOP to poisons and ramp-up mean Assassination can be strong on every fight.
- Nerfs to Combat are much appreciated. Means it is not mandatory on any fight but it has a place (e.g. nests on Ji-Kin or Ball Lightning).
- Mobility is fine. Step and Sprint are enough for most PvE mechanics.
- Survivability with Feint and Elusiveness is insane. Cloak resist part working for most mechanics is also v. strong and 1 min cd lines up with a lot of mechanics.
- MFD is insane on fights where there are lots of adds (mostly Horridon but also hcs and scenarios) and makes otherwise painful rampup less bad (it is also sooooo good for dailies). Anticipation is best on most fights especially with t15 2pc imo to avoid Envenom clipping.
- Only shame is Sub is too weak to riad with for me: too much risk for not enough reward.

Assassination:
-Much stronger than last tier in general
-Multi-rupture is practically on par with Combat for 2-3 target cleave
-Haste gemming once you get 2x RPPM trinkets is pretty amazing. Provides a much more fluid rotation with less downtime.
-Seems weak compared to other classes/specs when attacking ice walls on Heroic Durumu.

Combat:
I want my opinion of Combat to be better than it is, but it isn't. Over the past eight years, I've definitely found Combat more to my liking than Assassination, and this tier is kind of frustrating me. I've always liked the frantic nature of maximizing GCD usage during your CDs as Combat, but the T15 4pc just pushes the level of button mashing from fast, but managable, to out of control spammy. I was somewhat okay with the .8 GCD during AR. It wasn't that much of a jump. However, halving our 1 second GCD and still GCD capping is definitely not "fun" in my mind. The goal of a lower GCD should be to be GCD capped less, not more.

In terms of actual numbers, yeah Combat sims two percent higher... on pure Patchwerk fights. The problem with many fights this tier, especially Heroic, is that they are NOT Patchwerk. Off the top of my head, I can name Jin'rokh, Heroic Council, Heroic Tortos, Heroic Maegara, Heroic Durumu, and Iron Qon as fights where Combat is more a hinderance than anything else. The major contributor to this is Killing Spree. Casting Killing Spree on Iron Qon will cause him to drop a premature flame spear in melee. Heroic Durumu provides few opportunities to cast Killing Spree between beam phases, eye sore phases, force of will knockback, and Life Drain. On Maegara, killing spree doesn't even deal damage to the heads. On Concil, Killing Spree can cause to attack bosses besides the current target and put you right in the lightning trail that Kazra'jin leaves behind. On Jin'rokh, Killing Spree most of the time won't even gain the benefit of the damage pool.

Bottom line, too many GCDs and a Killing Spree that is limited in its uses makes me feel like that even though Combat sims well, it doesn't exactly play well.